America Is Slipping Behind India’s Clean Power Boom
When will US citizens realize how badly they’ve been shortchanged on renewables?
India is surging on renewables.
Photographer: Money Sharma/AFP/Getty Images
Once upon a time, the US was the sole clean energy superpower. Until 2011, it led the world in connecting wind and solar generators to the grid. Then China took over, to a point where its lead now looks unassailable: The People’s Republic added eight times more renewables than the US last year. This year, India is likely to overtake too.
The country connected 22 gigawatts of wind and solar in the first half — a dramatic recovery from a troubling slowdown in 2022 and 2023, and enough at full output to power nearly one-tenth of the grid1. Assuming this is maintained through December, that should put India ahead of the 40 GW that the US government expects this year.